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Media Statement        
by Lim Kit Siang  
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(Parliament, Friday): On July 17, 2007, Deputy Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak declared that Malaysia is an Islamic state driven by the fundamentals of Islam and not a secular state. He even went out of his way to emphasise that Malaysia had “never been a secular state”. 

Next day, Wednesday, July 18, 2007, just before the Cabinet meeting, MCA President and Housing and Local Government Minister, Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting spoke to Najib about the latter’s “717 Declaration”. 

What really transpired nobody would know, but the result is there for all to see – the ban on all mainstream media on comments on Najib’s “717 Declaration” that Malaysia is an Islamic State and had never been a secular state. 

Did the idea of the ban and blackout of all mainstream media on comments on Najib’s “717 Declaration” emanate from the MCA or did it come from Najib? 

Is the ban on all mainstream media from reporting comments on Najib’s “717 Declaration” that Malaysia is an Islamic State designed to salvage MCA from the political fall-outs in being a party to the jettisoning of the Merdeka “social contract”? 

This is not only a cowardly and undemocratic act, the gravest blow to press freedom in the 45 months of Abdullah premiership, but a great disservice to the integrity of the Merdeka social contract agreed by the forefathers of the major communities as the cardinal basis of nation building –  a secular Malaysia with Islam as the official religion. 

The solution is not to ban the press and deny Malaysians the right to speak up to defend the Merdeka social contract which had also been the life-work of the three first Prime Ministers, Tunku Abdul Rahman, Tun Razak and Tun Hussein, but for Najib to retract his “717 Declaration” and the Cabinet to reaffirm the Merdeka social contract that Malaysia had never been conceived as an Islamic state but as a secular state with Islam as the official religion. 

The question all Malaysians are entitled to a clear and unequivocal answer is whether the upcoming 50^th Merdeka Anniversary celebrations is for Malaysians to commemorate 50 years of a secular Malaysia or to mark its official end and the beginning of an Islamic state?

(20/7/2007)